The Team at SBH: Dr. Berthony Guerrier

“I grew up in Ti Goave and saw that the public hospital had problems. Sick people would go and wait for hours only to be turned away and not seen by a physician,” explains Dr. Berthony Guerrier, SBH’s obstetrician and gynecologist. “The health care system had problems and people suffered because of it.”

Dr. Guerrier describes an all-too-common experience for the sick seeking health care in Haiti. It was this injustice that helped him discover his passion for “helping to reduce the suffering” and pushed him to study medicine at the state university in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Despite the difficulty of gaining admission to the selective state-funded medical school, Dr. Guerrier was to providing care to those he saw suffering during his childhood.

Now, as one of the leaders of HEI/SBH’s mission to improve maternal health across the Southern Peninsula, Dr. Guerrier has provided critical services to women from Fond des Blancs and the surrounding areas for the past six years. With the help of two family practice physicians, he does prenatal and postnatal care, deliveries, and operations. He spends many nights on-call and devotes time to planning the details of our new Maternal Health Center.

Dr. Guerrier describes his thoughts about the new Maternal Health Center, “I am excited for it to be completed; I check on the progress every day.” He says it will be a “bel eksperyans,” which is Haitian Kreyòl for “beautiful experience”. The new building and equipment will allow him to offer more advanced and personal care. “I expect that better tools will give us better knowledge and help us to provide better care.” This will be visible through improved health outcomes and meaningful health care experiences.

For example, Dr. Guerrier believes that well-furnished and secluded delivery rooms will create a more intimate setting for women and families during some of the most important moments of life. Improved monitoring equipment will allow him to better track high blood pressure patients. And, the new NICU, which will be the only NICU on Haiti’s entire southern Peninsula, will give him a greater capacity to treat premature babies—perhaps the most vulnerable population in Haiti.

However, despite the excitement over the improved facilities, Dr. Guerrier’s work is likely to become even more challenging once the center is up and running. HEI/SBH expects that, as word spreads about the new Maternal Health Center, people will come from even further locations to seek high-quality medical care. The number of patient visits will surely increase, meaning that more and more women and children will receive the health care that they need and deserve. With their passion and commitment, Dr. Guerrier and his staff are up to the task.